Wednesday, August 21, 2013

GALAXIUS MONS

"Montreal’s Galaxius Mons takes two already-excellent solo artists and merges them into something incredible. Matt LeGroulx (EXPWY) and Ian Jarvis (Chairs) perform in each other’s projects’ live incarnations, so it’s no surprise that they’ve teamed up as a duo. Chairs dabbles a bit in electronic pop but EXPWY is strictly bossa, so it was surprising to hear they’d made a straight-up psychedelic synth-pop record. Happily, they immediately prove themselves to be masters of the form. Recording the entire thing using a couple of Moog Rogues, the two have created a landscape we very much want to explore, and perhaps permanently inhabit. The sounds they discover on this album could be considered the Platonic Ideal of synthesis, with the two skilled songwriters penning memorable singsong melodies over hypnotic drum loops. This meeting absolutely constitutes a supergroup in our books."